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Journalism of Courage
The United States launched a blistering attack on fellow World Trade Organization WTO member states on Thursday for failing to do more to cut global barriers to trade,criticising India in particular for trying to introduce a massive new loophole.
The time has come to speak bluntly, US ambassador Michael Punke told his counterparts at the Geneva-based body. We must not sit idly by as the WTOs negotiating function hurtles towards irrelevance.
Ambassadors to the 159-member WTO were meeting to review progress towards a possible deal to be signed in Bali in December,which would cut red tape from customs procedures,adding as much as 1 trillion towards global trade.
At the insistence of developing countries who objected to having to shoulder most of the burden of the red-tape reforms,a Bali agreement would also include limited reforms to rules on food and agriculture and special treatment for poor countries.
While such a deal would be a boost for the world economy,the scale of the negotiation has been massively cut back from the far more ambitious Doha Round of trade talks,which dragged on for a decade before finally collapsing in 2011.
